Friday, January 28, 2011

Day 3 of the 17 Day Diet

I am freezing to death. I've been drinking gallons and gallons of water. My urine could pass for Dasani right now. Other than that, I really like the 17 Day Diet. After all of the calories that I consumed over the holidays, simple meals like grilled chicken and steamed broccoli are tasting pretty good. On Wednesday afternoon, I went to the store and filled my cart with leafy greens, lean proteins, probiotic yogurt and fruit. My refrigerator is bulging with healthy, fresh meal choices. I haven't had a tall glass of iced tea for days. So far, so good.

When I ordered the 17 Day Diet book, I went all in by also purchasing the 17 Minute Workout DVD. How easy can it be?! A quick 17 minutes a day! That works perfectly for a person who prefers a high return on low effort. So, I popped the video in yesterday morning for a quick workout. There were choices: 1) 17 minute cardio abs (Nahhhh.), 2) 17 minute cardio buns (I think not.), 3) 17 minute total body conditioning (Hmmmm. A possibility.). I chose the 3rd option because it didn't mention the word "cardio." It began with a simple march in place. "Oh, yeah. I can do this!" I beamed. Then, the lady mentioned that we should have our hand weights close by. I forgave myself for not having any weights on hand. They had long since been wagged to the Goodwill collection truck that parks in the grocery store parking lot. Soon, we were lunging and my onscreen workout buddies were reaching for their weights. Having no weights, I settled on using my clenched fists to represent the added "resistance."

We bent, we stretched, we lunged, we sidestepped and marched. Every few minutes, the leader would call out something like "Now add the arms!" or "Add a hop!" or "Step-step-step!!" Stumbling to keep up with her, I tried to remember how I ever managed to be in a drill team or serve as a XO Sing Chairman back in the day. I wanted to run up the attic stairs to retrieve the tap shoes of my youth as proof that I once was the queen of the shuffle step. All of the coordination of my youth has leaked out of my bones. I have become "that lady" you see in exercises classes who is 3 beats behind thrusting her arms up when everyone else's are down. It wasn't long before I began to pant. "This is a great workout! And, my how quickly it has gone by!" Those words had no sooner floated through my brain when in the corner of the TV screen "10 Minutes Remaining!" popped up to mock me. Apparently, the 17 Minute people live in some sort of parallel universe where the exchange rate for seconds and minutes is far different than in my world.

I forged on. It wasn't pretty, but I was moving. I kept encouraging myself, "Even kind of marching and flailing my arms without weights beats sitting on the couch watching 'Toddlers and Tiaras!'" I began to get a tad thirsty, so I set down my imaginary weights and strolled across the room to take a long draught of my tall glass of iced water. Sauntering back to my exercise zone, I clenched my fists ready to join back in. "Now, THREE!... TWO!...ONE!...COME ON!" I decided to focus on the lady just behind the instructor. She was modeling the "modified" version of the exercises. She and I became friends. She was not pencil thin, and if you looked really close, it appeared that she was beginning to discreetly pant. I like her.

I totally went "off program" at lunch yesterday. Oh, and at dinner. At 11:30, I met a friend for sushi to celebrate her birthday. She and I then met our CASA kids for dinner. I couldn't have possibly expected any of them to accompany me to Souper Salad so that I could fill a trough with leafy greens topped with a boiled egg. I guess that actually makes today Day One all over again. A 17 Hour Diet would work much better for me. Oh, wait. I was on that diet at the first of the year. It is also commonly called the stomach virus.

So far, so good. Now that I have shared the above, you have become my "accountability partner." You will have your work cut out for you.